I am still trying to get this house unpacked from moving cross country. I am down to two rooms and I all but finished one yesterday.
I also spent time preparing our New Years day dinner. Here in the south it is tradition to eat black eyed peas and collard greens for New Years. The way it gets told most times is that families must cook, serve, and eat some black eyed peas and greens on the first day to ensure good luck and prosperity. Most often, it’s said that the black eyed peas bring luck while the greens (being green) mean more money.
We live in a gated community here in the West Ashley part of Charleston, SC. There are a handful of gardeners that the community uses to maintain their properties. One of them that comes around our house is named Earl. Earl is a very Southern man, we will talk about Earl later. Anyway, Earl brought us a big garbage bag FULL of collard greens and informed me to make them with Hoppin John for New Years as it was tradition. Now, being the WA state born and raised Yank that I am, I had to google Hoppin John to find out what he was talking about. Turns out Hoppin John is a dish using field peas or black eyed peas. Yesterday I took on this southern dish. I made Hopping John, collard greens and served it with cornbread. I have to tell you that it was delicious! Even the husband liked it.
The funniest thing that happened yesterday was this. We live on a little lake that has no name. We have a little dock on the back of the property and the husband recently got a 12 foot John boat with a trolling motor to go catch fish on the lake. Yesterday about noon Gary, my husband, and Lily, my oldest daughter, decided they wanted to go do a little fishing. I packed them a lunch for the boat and they headed down to the dock. Violet, my 11 month old, was fussing like she wanted to go too but in the past has really fussed over wearing her life jacket. I put a different life jacket on her and was stepping into the boat to go with Gary and Lily to see how Violet liked the ride. If she liked it I would just leave her with Gary and Lily but if she fussed then I was going to take her back to the house with me. So I get the life jacket on her and go to step into the boat. Gary and Lily were doing something with a fishing pole so nobody was holding the boat to the dock and it wasn't tied up. As I stepped into the boat, holding baby Violet in my arms, the boat started drifting away from the dock. I, with one leg in the boat and one on the dock, holding baby Violet, started doing the splits.... I yelled "I'm falling! I'm going in!" As I fell in the lake I held baby Violet up, passing her to Gary. I fell completely in the lake! Now, Violet got wet and cried but Gary saved her and her life jacket worked. LMAO! I almost lost a flip flop in the mud on the bottom of the lake but I saved them both.
I wonder if anyone across the lake saw the show. It was pretty funny.
After my Polar Bear Plunge I was really looking forward to my traditional Southern dinner.
Here are a couple of pictures from dinner. In hindsight I wish I had a picture of my falling in the lake with the baby. LOL!
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